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I might have to rethink this after looking at the Sorabji excerpt, but my top three in the hardest piece swepstakes have always been Stravinsky's "Three Movements from Petrouchka," Ravel's "Scarbo" and Brahms "Paganini Variations" (either book).

Originally posted by Max W: I think I just lowered my IQ by 30 points trying to figure that out. OUCH. [/b]

ICK!!! So quite a metric puzzle Nancarrow has presented us with, but how does it sound?

This is the sort of thing that made me a$$ itch in musical school. Composers just creating little self proclaimed 'ingenius' novelties and puzzles and calling them compositions. (disclaimer: I have not heard this work, nor any work by nancarrow. For all I know he's a genius, and I would love this piece if i heard it)

Is the mismatched meter really necessary? Could the desired "musical" effect he's hearing in his head NOT be achieved with conventional metric notation? It strikes me as nothing more than game playing and ego gratification. Where's the music? Seems to me its not about music at all, with this sort of thing. Its about invention and brain teasers.

Again, my apologies if I've mischaracterized this particular piece, but there are countless others that fit the description.

Another thing that would put me off playing piano works younger than myself is that how do I know there's any real music here to be played? Just because some guy with a PhD and a faculty position wrote it? Playing classical allows us to approach a work with the given that there is music there to be discovered. Current works do not guarantee any such thing. And so many of them are so intentionally demanding on the pianist, that the amount of work to prepare them is enormous, and for what? How does one play an inspired performance of a not-necessarily-inspired composition?

Ok there's my rant for the day. I do understand there is some great contemporary piano literature, but I also find there to be droves of crap flooding the field as well. (To be fair, I have no idea where nancarrow fits in that continuum).

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I was born the year Glenn Gould stop playing concerts. Coincidence?

Originally posted by Max W: I think I just lowered my IQ by 30 points trying to figure that out. OUCH. [/b]

ICK!!! So quite a metric puzzle Nancarrow has presented us with, but how does it sound?

This is the sort of thing that made me a$$ itch in musical school. Composers just creating little self proclaimed 'ingenius' novelties and puzzles and calling them compositions. (disclaimer: I have not heard this work, nor any work by nancarrow. For all I know he's a genius, and I would love this piece if i heard it)

Is the mismatched meter really necessary? Could the desired "musical" effect he's hearing in his head NOT be achieved with conventional metric notation? It strikes me as nothing more than game playing and ego gratification. Where's the music? Seems to me its not about music at all, with this sort of thing. Its about invention and brain teasers.

Again, my apologies if I've mischaracterized this particular piece, but there are countless others that fit the description.

Another thing that would put me off playing piano works younger than myself is that how do I know there's any real music here to be played? Just because some guy with a PhD and a faculty position wrote it? Playing classical allows us to approach a work with the given that there is music there to be discovered. Current works do not guarantee any such thing. And so many of them are so intentionally demanding on the pianist, that the amount of work to prepare them is enormous, and for what? How does one play an inspired performance of a not-necessarily-inspired composition?

Ok there's my rant for the day. I do understand there is some great contemporary piano literature, but I also find there to be droves of crap flooding the field as well. (To be fair, I have no idea where nancarrow fits in that continuum). [/b]

I agree. After quick read through without the piano (I don't have a piano at work), it seems typical of the the plink-plunk squeak stuff we here a lot of today. Rhythmically it's just a game because none of the beats really intertwine enough to do anything spectacular.

Originally posted by Thracozaag: It's my only one; I apologize for the horrible sound quality (and if you think it's hard to play normally, try playing it when it's been choreographed and you're following a dancer)

Thanks! hmmm.. well, ok, i only listened to it once, which is not enough for accessing ANY piece of music.

I guess it did sound more "interesting" than I would have expected. I do maintain that the mismatched meters werent necessary, and could have been scored conventionally. Seems scoring that way made it more difficult for the pianist, but since you were the pianist, you tell me, did the way he notated it actually end up being EASIER to read, or more difficult as I suspect?

Also, was this written expressly to be a dance work with choreography? That puts it in an entirely different context (part of a larger work). Some dance music can stand alone without the footwork, some cant. Also, I may be biased here, as I also studied dance seriously.

Well, I dont like the piece on first hearing. But thats just my subjective impression. My earlier remarks may or may not apply to this work, but certainly to others.

You do have my admiration, and my sympathy, for having accomodated this piece. Thanks so much for sharing.

But let me ask you, since you know it intimately: Do YOU enjoy the piece? Do you find it an inspired composition? Would you recommend it as a work for a pianist to learn, so as to be enriched by it?

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I was born the year Glenn Gould stop playing concerts. Coincidence?

It wasn't expressly written to be a dance work, but the fact that it was able to be choreographed so wonderfully the way it was, lends a great deal of credibility to the work, for me. Would have I learned it were it not required for the concerts? no. Did I enjoy practicing it? no. Did I enjoy performing it with an amazing artist by my side? Absolutely.

koji

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"I'm a concert pianist--that's a pretentious way of saying I'm unemployed at the moment."--Oscar Levant

And so many of them are so intentionally demanding on the pianist, that the amount of work to prepare them is enormous, and for what? How does one play an inspired performance of a not-necessarily-inspired composition?

Like I said, some compositions should just directly be written in MIDI and save every one else the pain.